Setting Interface Preferences

You can change many of the settings that affect the AutoCAD LT interface and drawing environment in the Preferences dialog box. For example, you can establish how often AutoCAD LT automatically saves the drawing to a temporary file, and you can specify the support directories that contain the files that you use most often. Experiment with the settings in the Preferences dialog box until you find the best environment for your needs.

In the Preferences dialog box you can choose options to do the following:

• Choose whether AutoCAD LT issues a warning beep when you enter an unknown command or take an action that is not permitted.
• Turn on the automatic save option so that AutoCAD LT saves your drawing at specified time intervals. To use this option, in the Preferences dialog box on the System tab, select Automatic Save Every and enter the interval in minutes. By default, files saved automatically are temporarily assigned the file name aclt.sv$.
• Insert the user name, drawing name, revision date, and time into your drawing. The information is automatically updated as needed. Choose Time and Date Stamp from the Tools menu or use REVDATE. By default, the user name used by the date and time stamp is the name specified during installation. If a different person works on the drawing, you can change the name.
• Specify the colors used in the AutoCAD LT Window and change the color of the drawing area, the text window background, the text in the AutoCAD LT window or text window, and the crosshairs.
• Change the fonts used in the AutoCAD LT window and in the text window. This setting does not affect the text in your drawings. If you have a low-resolution monitor, changing the fonts in the AutoCAD LT window is one way to display more buttons on the toolbar.
• Set the search path AutoCAD LT uses to find support files such as text fonts, drawings, linetypes, and hatch patterns. This option helps improve performance when AutoCAD LT is loading these files.
• Specify an alternative location for the temporary files that AutoCAD LT creates on disk and then deletes when you exit the program; the files are created in the current drawing directory by default. The directory you specify must not be write-protected (for example, if you are working on a network or are opening files on a CD). Be sure to specify a drive with plenty of free disk space.
• Specify a custom menu. The default menu is aclt.mnu.

See Also
Saving a Drawing